EDITOR’S NOTE: The three-day Thinning Veil tour this weekend was canceled today because 18 people canceled, said owner Geoff Gardner. He said all deposits will be returned.
PORT TOWNSEND — There’s more to Port Townsend than ordinary reality, say paranormal tour guides on the eve of Halloween.
“There is a lot of interest as to whether there is more out there because people like to be scared or wonder if there is something they are going to see when they go around that next corner,” said Geoff Gardner about The Thinning Veil, a three-day, fee-based paranormal excursion of town that is scheduled to begin today.
Gardner admitted that “there are a bit of theatrics” on the tours but said the incidents discussed are confirmed by history or legend.
“We want to make it fun and entertaining, but we have done a lot of research through old newspapers, finding stories of death and mayhem that have taken place in town,” he said.
“There are a few suicides who decided to stick around town, and sightings of these ghosts continue to happen.”
One may have occurred last week when Gardner was leading a tour down Water Street, he said.
A small, blue rubber ball came out of nowhere.
It didn’t bounce because it landed in the path of a tourist who captured it under her shoe.
“I’m not sure what that was,” Gardner said. “We’re still trying to figure it out.”
Added his partner Andrew Lusk: “There are a lot of things that can be explained, but there are also a lot that can’t be explained.”
The two said one legendary ghostly presence is at a city landmark.
“We talk [on the tour] about the ghost of Abigail that hangs out on the top of the stairs near the [Haller] fountain,” Gardner said.
“Our researchers are trying to get more information about her,” he said.
“All we know is that she was shot in the throat either by her father or her boyfriend,” he said researchers had told him.
Other possible ghosts in Port Townsend are those of Charles Eisenbeis Jr., who committed suicide in the basement of the Baker Block Building, and Israel Katz, a prominent businessman who disappeared in 1917, said Gardner and Lusk.
The Thinning Veil this weekend will include courses with such names as “Spiritual Protection,” “The Basics of Ghost Hunting,” “Turn-of-the-Century Funerary Traditions” and “Spirit Communication,” which is otherwise known as a seance.
Gardner said about 25 people had registered and paid the fee for the weekend.
“People are always looking for something fun to do that is a little offbeat,” he said.
While this weekend’s excursion is a special Halloween event, Gardner and Lusk offer the tours year-round.
There is no schedule, Gardner said, and they’ll take any size group out ghost hunting.
Gardner said he has never staged a paranormal event for tour participants but may hire people in the future to act out the roles of the spirits.
“We’ll announce it ahead of time,” he said.
“We’ll never say, ‘Hey, there’s a ghost.’”
Gardner said most of this weekend’s participants are traveling for the event, with people coming from Seattle, Tacoma and Indiana, among other places.
The participants don’t fit a specific demographic, he said.
“This will appeal to anyone who has an open mind about the afterlife and has questions about what is beyond,” Lusk said.
“There is something that drives people to question what is going on that makes things go bump in the night.”
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Jefferson County Editor Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or cbermant@peninsuladailynews.com.
